Job 3:7

3:7 Indeed, ¹  let that night be barren; ² 

let no shout of joy ³  penetrate ⁴  it!

Job 36:27

36:27 He draws up drops of water;

they distill ⁵  the rain into its mist, ⁶ 

Job 41:7

41:7 Can you fill its hide with harpoons

or its head with fishing spears?

Job 41:22

41:22 Strength lodges in its neck,

and despair ⁷  runs before it.

Job 41:28

41:28 Arrows ⁸  do not make it flee;

slingstones become like chaff to it.

[3:7]  ¹ tn The particle הִנֵּה (hinneh, “behold”) in this sentence focuses the reader’s attention on the statement to follow.

[3:7]  ² tn The word גַּלְמוּד (galmud) probably has here the idea of “barren” rather than “solitary.” See the parallelism in Isa 49:21. In Job it seems to carry the idea of “barren” in 15:34, and “gloomy” in 30:3. Barrenness can lead to gloom.

[3:7]  ³ tn The word is from רָנַן (ranan, “to give a ringing cry” or “shout of joy”). The sound is loud and shrill.

[3:7]  ⁴ tn The verb is simply בּוֹא (bo’, “to enter”). The NIV translates interpretively “be heard in it.” A shout of joy, such as at a birth, that “enters” a day is certainly heard on that day.

[36:27]  ⁵ tn The verb means “to filter; to refine,” and so a plural subject with the drops of water as the subject will not work. So many read the singular, “he distills.”

[36:27]  ⁶ tn This word עֵד (’ed) occurs also in Gen 2:6. The suggestion has been that instead of a mist it represents an underground watercourse that wells up to water the ground.

[41:22]  ⁹ tn This word, דְּאָבָה (dÿ’avah) is a hapax legomenon. But the verbal root means “to languish; to pine.” A related noun talks of dejection and despair in Deut 28:65. So here “despair” as a translation is preferable to “terror.”

[41:28]  ¹³ tn Heb “the son of the bow.”